This thesis explores the effects of art-making in group art therapy sessions for people affected by Parkinson's Disease. It examines their experience of self through active engagement with art materials. It also draws on the experience of family caregivers and of professionals providing other therapeutic support for these patients. The research methodology is based on feminist, post-structuralist epistemological thought, situating the research as a political, reality-altering endeavour shaped by, and interpreted through, the researcher's particular ideological lens. The thesis emphasises the importance of developing a critical overview of the research context and considering how dominant discourses have shaped both the individual patient's experience of Parkinson's and the service approach to ways of improving their quality of life. A medical model is viewed as determining a narrow understanding and experience of the condition. Broadening the focus of the work to attend to how Parkinson's is culturally and socially embedded provides new understandings of its effects on patients and their wider needs. The research design has a strong participatory component drawing on the support of a consultancy group of six people affected by Parkinson's and three family caregivers, all seen as experts through their personal experience of the condition. The researcher defines her position as researcher-near using her background as artist, art therapist and her experience of working with people affected by Parkinson's at the research site. The research design is inspired by group art therapy practice, and takes research as praxis for theory building. Social science qualitative interviewing was used with four focus groups, and in ten semi-structured individual interviews which involved participant selected examples of their group therapy artwork. Nine audio-recordings of group art therapy sessions were collected. The researcher used art-making throughout the research process to create visual researcher diaries, and 'response' art as a way of exploring the material gathered for analysis. Besides providing an opportunity to consider the role of visual expression to complement verbal, this English language thesis uses data collected in Spanish and Catalan. Translation across languages (spoken, written and visual) and cultures became a method through which to consider interpretation, explore nuances and question assumptions. The dilemmas faced in translation enhanced researcher reflexivity and facilitated exploration of the space between art and language. This thesis offers an understanding of the potential contribution of group art therapy within six themes: 'Self-construction and discovery'; 'Material action'; 'Aesthetic group movement'; 'New perspectives'; 'Artwork as legacy'; and 'Physical transformation of issues'. These themes support the view that group art therapy acted as a catalyst for well-being and better functioning for participants, and that it can be modelled as a continuous process of embodied enquiry for those affected by Parkinson's. The triangular therapeutic relationship is explored and the terms 'creator' - 'artwork' - 'audience' are proposed to recognise the flexibility in the art-maker's position between creator and audience of their artwork. That artwork is conceptualised as an active meaning generator in the group art therapeutic encounter and the artistic intersubjective matrix is explored in relation to therapeutic factors specific to group art therapy. Implications for working with other related chronic, life changing conditions are elaborated.

The research objective of this qualitative case study was to explore how art interventions could be useful to teach at-risk adolescents how to identify with and develop, personal strengths and resilient qualities. The subjects in this study were receiving treatment in an outpatient mental health clinic for a variety of diagnoses and participated in a ten-week resiliency building art- therapy group. During the weekly sessions participants followed a specific protocol including psycho-education, art therapy interventions and processing of the art products. The art interventions were based on the literature and designed to develop personal strengths, self- reliance, self-discovery and communication, problem solving, flexibility, compassion and empathy, future planning and teamwork. The results indicate that at-risk adolescents are able to identify, discuss and develop solutions to their challenges using the art interventions and psycho- education and that the group art-therapy modality provides a unique tool to accelerate positive outcomes and resilience in an outpatient mental health setting.

Darbe atlikta teorinė elgesio ir emocijų sunkumų turinčių vaikų samprata, sutrikimų atsiradimo priežastys, dailės terapijos galimybės bendravimo įgūdžių plėtojimui, analizė. Kvazieksperimento metodu atliktas tyrimas, kurio tikslas - ištirti dailės terapijos poveikį bendravimo įgūdžių plėtojimui, ugdant priešmokyklinio amžiaus vaikus, turinčius elgesio ir emocijų sunkumų. Atlikta matematinė aprašomoji duomenų analizė, pateikta naudojant atvejo analizės metodą. Tyrime dalyvavo patogiuoju būdu atrinkti 9 priešmokyklinio amžiaus vaikai, turintys elgesio ir emocijų sunkumų, kurie sudarė tikslinę grupę. Empirinėje dalyje analizuoti stebėjimo protokoluose užfiksuoti duomenys apie bendravimo įgūdžių raišką, dinamiką dailės terapijos sesijos metu, stebėtas poveikis. Diagnostinių piešinių testais analizuota ugdytinių bendravimo įgūdžių požymių kaita. Ieškota bendravimo įgūdžių požymių piešiniuose bei bendravimo įgūdžių duomenų, fiksuotų stebėjimo protokoluose, sąsajos. Atlikus tyrimo duomenų analizę, suformuluotos pagrindinės išvados: • Stebėjimo protokolų duomenys parodė tendenciją dailės terapijos sesijų metu pasireikšti pozityviai bendravimo raiškai. • pirminio ir baigiamojo diagnostinių H-T-P piešinių rezultatai atskleidė bendravimo požymių piešiniuose kitimą teigiama linkme. Žemos savivertės, agresyvumo, depresyvumo požymių, įtakojančių žemą bendravimo poreikį ar neigiamą bendravimo raišką, sumažėjo, o bendravimo poreikio požymių padaugėjo. / The paper deals with theoretical analysis of children with emotional and behavioral difficulties and opportunities of art therapy in developing communication skills. The purpose of investigation was to find out whether art therapy has a positive effect on the development of communication skills of preschool children with emotional and behavioral difficulties. Quasi-experimental method was used to investigate art therapy effect. The mathematical descriptive analysis of the data was presented using the case study method. The study included 9 preschool children with behavioral and emotional difficulties, target group was selected using convenient way. In empirical part were analyzed data, about resolution skills and dynamics of the art therapy in sessions. By the help of diagnostic drawing tests attributes of communication skills were analyzed and captured in monitoring protocols. After the data analysis, the most important empirical conclusions that were drawn are: 1. Performed experiment revealed positive effect of art therapy on the development of social and communication skills. 2. Monitoring protocols showed a tendency to unfold the expression of positive communication 3. H-T-P drawing test results revealed positive direction. Low self-esteem, aggression, depressive symptoms, affecting the low need for communication or expression of negative communication decreased after experiment.